Snowbound
by Amethyst Hunter
Summary: Oneshot. Ban and Akabane share a winter morning's respite.


Title: Snowbound

Author: Amethyst Hunter

Pairing: Ban/Akabane

Rating: PG-13 (innuendo)

Warnings/Spoilers: None

Disclaimer: I don't own GB.

Notes: A sort-of gift fic for AbstractConcept, whose recent journalings of Teh Pretty White Stuff partially inspired it.

Summary: Snow, snuggles, and snark. Can't forget the snark.

--

Alarm clocks, Ban decided, had only one purpose in life, and that was to die as gruesome and as painful a death as possible. He raised his right fist, preparing to send yet another unfortunate victim to the garbage-can graveyard (he was forever railing on Akabane to buy the cheap ones so it wouldn't cost as much to replace them), when he realized it wasn't the clock making the shrill noise in his ear.

The cell phone was the guilty party this morning. Ban grumbled a string of profanities and grabbed it, flicking the case open with his thumb. "Ginji, you know what friggin' time it is?"

"Ban-chan! Look outside! It's SNOWING!"

"Eh?"

"It's snowing! Big pretty flakes! Paul says they're calling for at least eight inches today! Come downstairs so we can go sledding!" Ginji squealed.

Ban winced and held the phone away from his ear. "Ginji, there better be one of two reasons to call me this early – "

"It's past eight, Ban-chan – "

" – either you better be dead or the monkey-trainer better have hung himself from the rearview mirror of my car with one of the thread-spool's strings."

"But Ban-chan! I always wanted to go sledding! Natsumi-chan's telling me about this really good park where they have a great big hill that's perfect for it!"

_Ah shit, _Ban thought, _here it comes _–

"Please, Ban-chan? Come sledding with us?" There was a hesitant catch in Ginji's voice, and then he added, "Akabane-san can come too...as long as he promises not to kill anybody..."

Ban made a face and mouthed a profanity. "Oh, all right. Give me this place's name – " he fumbled around on the nightstand for a pen and some paper to write down the address of the park – "We'll meet you guys there later."

"Great! See you then, Ban-chan!"

Ban ended the call and tossed the closed phone onto the nightstand. He flopped back into the mattress with an irritable sigh.

Beside him, a mass of red and black sheets and blankets stirred. "Mm...who was that, Midou-kun?" murmured a sleepy timbre.

"Ginji wants to go sledding. It's snowing outside – or so he told me. I haven't looked out the window yet this morning."

"Mm...yes. Weather report last night said to expect ten inches."

"Nice. That'll be fun, scraping the ice and shit off Ladybug's windshield."

"So don't," Akabane sighed. "Stay here, where it's warm." He burrowed like a mole further into the covers. The tousled mop of his long black hair was barely visible now.

Ban yawned. "Hey. Stay on your side of the covers." He yanked back a mound of comforter. "I told him I'd go later. He said you're welcome to come too, if you want." A snort of laughter curled the edges of his mouth. "You're not allowed to stab people though."

"Mm. Is sledding fun?"

"It is when you're trying to unseat Doctor Doolittle in mid-slide with a well-timed snowball."

A soft chuckle, followed by a long yawn. "You're terrible, Midou-kun."

Ban smirked. "He's got it coming after that little stunt he pulled with the porcupines and my tires."

They lay in silence for a few minutes, and then Ban asked, "So, you gonna go?"

Without opening his eyes, Akabane replied, "Are you?"

"Yeah, I promised. But not right away. At least not till I've eaten breakfast." Ban's stomach had excellent timing – it gurgled as soon as he finished his sentence.

"Mmm."

Ban reached down to scratch an itch on his thigh and noticed that another itch was flaring, judging by the impressive morning erection his groin was currently sporting. He rolled over on his side to stare at what appeared to be Akabane's back – he couldn't quite tell, what with the several dozen blankets that were piled on top of the thin body. "No wonder I was freezing last night," he muttered.

The tuft of dark hair at the top of the covers shifted. "I don't recommend moving these covers, Midou-kun," a pleasant but dangerous voice warned.

"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't," Ban snapped.

Akabane sighed, this time in mild annoyance. He rolled over and opened one baleful purple eye, and a pale fist emerged from the bedcovers. "I'll give you four. One – " a scalpel shot out from between his fingers – "two – " another – "three – " and another – "four – " and one more. "I think those are excellent reasons, don't you?"

"Oh, put your sharpies away. I'll just kick your ass in spite of them anyway," Ban snorted, but he lowered the hand that had been about to grab a generous helping of comforter and drag it over to his side of the bed. "You're a doctor and a transporter. You ought to be used to skimping on sleep."

"You're thinking of students and interns. Big difference. And I'm not officially practicing medicine any more." There was a subtle _snick_ as the scalpels receded.

"But you get calls at all hours for transport jobs, don't you?"

Akabane closed his eye. "My regular mediators know better than to disturb me at certain hours. Especially if it's just for a routine delivery."

"I thought you got off on fighting. You'd take beauty sleep over a stash of cash and the chance to practice your messy handwriting?"

"I do when it's this early." Akabane cracked his jaw wide then and unleashed a fearsome yawn. "I feel a decade older without a good night's rest."

"Bullshit. You don't even look any older than me in the mornings."

"Midou-kun, at this hour and without coffee, _everyone_ looks a decade older."

"Hn. Good point."

Ban closed his own eyes and he must have drifted off, because the next thing he knew he'd reopened them to find the clock showing 9:23 at him. Amazing, how the simple act of shutting one's eyes could magically make time flow in an instant. Too bad that trick didn't work on a job when he was facing clods like Undead Hishiki. He contemplated going back to sleep but to his disgruntlement found that he was now wide awake. A glance toward the window proved his partner's earlier exclamations right: the snow was coming down in thick abundance. A second glance at the tent over the lower half of his body proved that his mini-snakebite hadn't lost its interest in exercising. Ban thought something ought to be done about that.

He poked Akabane between the shoulder blades. "Hey. As long as we're up, wanna get it on?"

Akabane sniffed with dry amusement. "You're insatiable, Midou-kun."

"No, just horny." Ban crept over Akabane's side and reached underneath the covers, feeling around for bare flesh to fondle. "How about you?" His fingers brushed the prominent point of a hipbone and threatened to trespass lower.

Akabane made a sigh that sounded more like a hiss, and inched away from his lover's explorative hands. "Ask me later, when I'm awake enough to appreciate it."

Ban continued his hands' spelunking and grasped warm, stiffening flesh, which he squeezed gently. "I found at least one part of you that's _very _appreciative," he leered.

Akabane swatted lightly at him with a wadded-up section of blanket, twisting away to avoid being groped some more. "Please don't make me Jackal you first thing in the morning, Midou-kun. Laundering blood out of sheets is easier said than done," he groused matter-of-factly.

Grumbling about the other man's lack of interest in the game, Ban sagged onto his back and stared at the ceiling for a good twenty minutes. When he found himself trying to count imaginary spots on the paint he decided to bug Akabane some more.

"Aka-baaaa-neeeee," he called in a teasing whisper. "I'm waiiiiii-tiiiiing..." When no answer was immediately forthcoming he tugged lightly at the strands of black hair. "C'mon, Kuro-chan, it's not as much fun if I have to play with myself. Aren't you the one who's always telling me that a job worth doing is one that's enjoyable?"

"Not when it involves you addressing me in such a horrendous fashion. Honestly, Midou-kun. 'Kuro-chan'?" Ban could practically hear the nose-wrinkling in his lover's tone.

"Beats me calling you 'asshole' or 'monkey-man.'"

"I believe you've already used the former during our relationship. Several times, if my memory serves me correctly," Akabane noted archly.

"Anyway, if I'm 'Midou-kun' all the time, then I ought to get to call you something like 'Kuro-chan' once in a while."

"You usually call me by my alias..."

"I kinda like 'Kuro-chan.'"

"Well, _I _don't," Akabane replied, with just a twinge of haughtiness in his voice. "It's not proper."

"Wait, wait – " Ban shook with muted laughter. "You carve strangers up like a Christmas goose, and you think a goofy little nickname is some kind of etiquette breach?" He laughed louder. "Oh man. You crack me up, Jackal, you really do."

Akabane twisted his head over his shoulder to give Ban an indignant look. "Well, it isn't. It doesn't sound right, for one thing. There are certain names one can get away with giving silly alterations to. Mine does not happen to be one of them."

Ban shrugged. "Neither does mine, but I let Ginji call me 'Ban-chan' anyway. If it makes him happy..."

"That's different."

"How so?"

"When Ginji-kun says it, it's cute."

"So you'd let him call you 'Kuro-chan,' but not me?"

"Of course not. Ginji-kun knows better." Akabane reached behind and clutched Ban's hand in a short squeeze. "And jealousy doesn't become you, Midou-kun," he added with a warmer tone.

Ban squeezed his lover's hand back. "I'm not jealous."

"Mm." Having accrued experience with their unique lexicon, this was, Ban knew, Akabane-speak for _you are boring me now. _

He tossed and turned for another ten minutes, trying to make himself fall back asleep, but his body wasn't having any of it. The makeshift tent in his lap had subsided somewhat with the lack of engagement, but his brain was restless and demanded further attention. Ban wondered if it was worth the risk of a J on tender parts to bother Akabane once more and decided that it was. They seldom had real verbal fights; most of their battling was done on a physical threshold. His lover possessed remarkable reserves of patience even when his tolerance was strained to its limits. Ban admired this trait in Akabane, though it was one he himself wasn't concerned with cultivating. He had little tolerance for fools even at the best of times.

Switching to German, Ban said, "Mein lieber Kuroudo, da Sie nicht am Geschlecht interessiert sind, möglicherweise möchten Sie mich anstatt kochen Frühstück? Und dienen Sie es mir auf diesem herrlichen blanken Körper von Ihrem, hmm?"

This time there was a low growl. "Haven't you ever heard of the saying 'let sleeping jackals lie'?"

"That's dogs, you idiot, and yes, but I don't give a damn. What about my request?"

Akabane, sexy son of a bitch that he was, sounded smug when he responded. "I'm afraid you'll have to teach me something in German other than profanities and sexually explicit terms, if you expect an answer."

Ban blew a raspberry at him. "I asked if you'd do something for me. That's not related to sex, that is."

A longsuffering sigh issued from his lover's lips. "What, then?"

"I want food. I'm hungry."

Akabane pulled the comforter completely over his head. "How interesting. Go eat, then, and kindly cease pestering me before I forget how much I adore you and send you out to play in a Bloody Hurricane."

"Pestering you is _my_ idea of entertainment," Ban sassed, and pushed away the blankets to get up. The cool air promptly turned his skin to gooseflesh and he shuddered. On winter nights they usually dressed in pajamas, but last evening neither of them had been in the mood to wear clothes to bed. Ban was tempted to dive back under the covers and spoon with Akabane – sleeping with him was like snuggling with a hot-water bottle; even as skinny as he was the other man radiated a surprising amount of body heat – but his stomach protested with a louder rumble.

Stomach won over skin and he swung his legs over the edge of the bed. He'd put on his bathrobe, Ban decided, eyeing the garment slung over the closet door on the other side of the room. He pushed off from the bed and stood up.

"Ah! Ee! Ooh! Yah! Hah! Ah! Hoo! Gah! _Damn!_" Ban shot a nasty glare in the direction of muffled laughter. "Quit that. It's not funny," he growled as he snatched the robe and struggled into it, dancing from foot to foot in a vain effort to avoid touching the chilled floor.

This, of course, only made Akabane chuckle harder. "I told you so," his lover sing-songed from his cozy hiding place underneath the covers.

"Bite me, Jackal. When you've lived on the streets for as long as I have you learn to eat when you can."

"Is that so. Well, when you've lived with boredom for as long as I have you learn to take pleasure where you find it. And right now, I'm content to enjoy this heated cocoon I've made." Akabane peered out from the edge of the down comforter and extended a slender arm. "Come back to bed and perhaps you might find hunger of a more entertaining sort."

Ban smirked in spite of his discomfort. "A second ago you were whining about me not letting you sleep. Now you're in the mood for nooky? Either way you can't get enough of me, can you? I don't blame you, I guess. I find me pretty irresistible too."

Akabane wound the sheets more closely about himself. "I admit, you've spoiled me for anyone else. How very naughty of you." He didn't sound particularly put out by the prospect.

"Didn't hear any complaints from you last night. Besides, I'm a witch, and causing trouble is what we witches do best." Ban tiptoed out of the bedroom, trying to avoid as much contact with the cold floor as he could while he headed for the kitchen.

Quick examination revealed that although the pantry and refrigerator were full – evidently his lover had had the foresight to go grocery-shopping in anticipation of the snowstorm – most of the stocks required preparation time longer than five minutes. Ban didn't feel like expending the extra energy to make pancakes or omelets, so he settled for some toaster pastries and cold leftover sausages from yesterday.

As he was arranging the fare on a plate a wicked idea for a very special treat occurred to him, and Ban grinned with fiendish glee. He finished pouring two small glasses of orange juice, and set up the other items on a tray. When all but the finishing touch was complete he chose the piece de resistance, rolling it in his hands until it was nice and plump. He made sure to place it in the middle of the other sausages so that it would stand out.

Balancing his tray of goodies, Ban's grin nearly stretched all the way off his face as he carried his bounty back to the bedroom.

"Thirsty, Jackal?"

There was a rustle of covers as Akabane's head partially emerged again. "A little, I suppose," he murmured. "What did you bring?"

"Orange juice or protein drink. Pick your poison."

"Protein drink..?" Akabane's eyes flew open when he sensed Ban standing before him on his side of the bed, and widened further when he saw the offering being presented to him.

Nestled comfortably between the other sausages and a pair of warm toaster pastries was his lover's erection.

"Gives new meaning to the phrase 'having breakfast in bed,' doesn't it?"

Akabane blinked once, twice. Then he smiled, and dissolved into quiet laughter. "Only you, Midou-kun. Only you." He gave Ban a coy look through the fringes of his wild black mane. "What would you say if I told you I wanted scrambled eggs for breakfast instead, hmm?"

"I'd say you're shit outta luck, and you'll eat what I put on your plate and like it," Ban retorted.

Akabane's laugh was musical in its amusement. "My, my. A bit touchy about our cuisine, are we?" He patted the side of the bed, wearing an indulgent smirk. "Very well. Come here, Midou-kun. We'll share breakfast together and then we'll go sledding with Ginji-kun."

"And I'll call you 'Kuro-chan' too, right?"

Akabane smiled and kissed Ban's lips. "Not if you don't want to have to explain to Ginji-kun why the snow is tinted red instead of white," he answered sweetly as he pulled his lover, tray and all, down towards the bed and on top of him.

--

My dear Kuroudo, since you're not interested in sex, maybe you'd like to cook me breakfast instead? And serve it to me on that gorgeous naked body of yours, hmm?

The above translation is courtesy of though, being that I'm not familiar with the German language, I'm informed that the more correct version would be something like the following:

_Mein lieber Kuroudo, da Sie nicht am/an (not quite sure about that- grammar- ugh but I think 'am' is correct in this case) Geschlechtsverkehr (but in Germany we do use the word 'sex' as well- that would be 'da Sie nicht an Sex interessiert sind') interessiert sind, möchten Sie mir stattdessen möglicherweise ('vielleicht' would work as well) Frühstück machen? Und es mir auf Ihrem großartigen ('großartigen' seems a little peculiar to me, but it is the right translation for gorgeous)nackten Körper servieren, hmm?_


End file.
